


Чёрный Орёл [Black Eagle]

by GloriaMundi



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Community: trope_bingo, Gen, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-22
Updated: 2015-10-22
Packaged: 2018-04-27 13:30:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5050372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GloriaMundi/pseuds/GloriaMundi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Like a dark angel his attacker wheels and stoops. The wings are ridiculously broad, all black with an oily iridescent sheen. The body -- the man -- between them is dressed in black, with a mask covering his face. He has arms as well as wings, and Steve sees the glint of wicked talons. Like a bird's. But birds don't have guns.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Чёрный Орёл [Black Eagle]

The first Steve knows of it is the atavistic terror as the light's blocked out above him. It's instinct to duck under his shield, and he thanks instinct when he hears the screech of metal on metal. A drone? Some kind of --

He jackknifes up, punching all the force of his arm behind the shield. There's a rushing clattering noise and for a moment he thinks 'Sam': but it's not Sam above him.

Like a dark angel his attacker wheels and stoops. The wings are ridiculously broad, all black with an oily iridescent sheen. The body -- the man -- between them is dressed in black, with a mask covering his face. He has arms as well as wings, and Steve sees the glint of wicked talons. Like a bird's. But birds don't have guns.

Steve ducks and rolls and ends up mostly under someone's wrecked SUV. Above him there's a tremendous crash. The bird-man has kicked the car, and Steve scrambles to retain his cover. Calculates angles: hurls the shield, though that cowering instinct (millions of years of ancestors fearing death from above) tells him to hunker down and hope he won't be seen.

The man's goggles are reflective and blank. Steve thinks he's probably tall: definitely strong. There's long brown hair whipping across the black mask, barely an inch of pale skin exposed. Gunfire: thank God here's Sam, swooping in like salvation, firing with both guns at Steve's attacker. Who has to be the Black Eagle that Natasha spoke of. A legend, a ghost, a killer: a symbol of anti-American sentiment, an antithesis for the eagle that's SHIELD's emblem.

Steve takes a moment to breathe, and to watch as the two tumble and tussle through the air. He can't see how the Eagle's wings are attached: it's almost as though they are a part of him. And the hands -- Sam gets in a kick to the Eagle's wrist and Steve sees the talons spasm open, dropping the weapon they held. Like a bird's: two fingers and an opposing thumb, all tipped with long dark razor-sharp blades. Steve wonders if it's his own blood glistening on them. Or Sam's.

Sam's down, curled round himself on the asphalt, groaning: the Eagle has torn away one of his wings as though it were made of paper. Steve wants to go to him, get him safe: but Sam's moving, breathing, choking into his comm. And the Eagle's launching himself at Steve down the middle of the bridge. One pounding beat of those clamorous wings and he's on Steve, forcing him down. He kicks, punches, claws: sends the Eagle somersaulting away, that black mask torn free by some lucky blow.

He lands like an acrobat, turns --

Fuck. _Fuck_. Steve knows the face revealed. Could catalogue every way in which it's Bucky's face: the cleft chin, the wide mouth, the eyes. The eyes that are empty of any recognition.

His focus narrows. Around him the world is in flames: he doesn't care. Sam's here somewhere, Natasha too. He doesn't care. 

\--Bucky...

\--Who the hell is Bucky?

It's not the voice that Steve remembers, but it's ... not so far off, either. There's a foreign accent layered there -- unsurprising, if he's been in Russia all these years -- but Steve would swear there's Brooklyn underneath it all.

\--You're James Buchanan Barnes, he says, letting the Eagle -- Bucky -- force him back towards the parapet. --Sergeant James Barnes, 107th. I'm your friend. 

\--You're my mission.

Steve ducks under a wing -- fuck, those feathers are sharp as hell: he can feel blood on his face from brushing against them -- and punches Bucky in the gut. It's like punching a wall: but Bucky falls back a step or two.

\--Bucky, it's Steve. You've known me all your life.

Bucky says nothing, just comes at him again: Steve lifts his right arm (where the hell's his shield?) to deflect the sweep of Bucky's wing (still can't see the harness that holds them on, else he'd be able to tear them off) and finds himself with a bleeding palm and one shimmering, knife-sharp feather.

\--I'm not going to fight you, he says. --You're my friend.

The Eagle doesn't speak. His eyes are white all the way around, like a spooked kid. He lands another tremendous haymaker, and Steve finds himself flying backwards over the crumbling, bullet-scored parapet of the bridge.

It's easy to let go. It's like falling asleep. Like falling. Like Bucky from the train. If Bucky'd had the wings then he'd have flown away. Steve wants to fly but he's falling, the whole world falling with him through the loud filthy air, and if Bucky doesn't know him -- but Bucky did know him, Steve would swear that Bucky knew him after that last terrible blow --

Something grabs hold of him, shoulder and thigh: something sharp, digging through his clothes and into his flesh. He barely registers the pain against the background agony that he wants to fall away from. There's a lurch like riding the Cyclone, riding a rollercoaster, like the moment when a parachute opens --

Steve opens his eyes. Beneath him, the bridge is burning. There are sirens, screams, horns blaring, choppers coming in. Steve, though, Steve's hurtling up, he's being carried, borne away. Rapt, rapture, raptor. Above him the Eagle's wings beat steadily, bearing him north.


End file.
